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Guard Coalition
The Guard Coalition is a guild of trained and organized knights that seek to defend Duilintinn and her people. Its main hub is located in Mulladún, House Jackie, Duilintinn, with a secondary hub at The Whetstone. Organization The Guard is definitely more like the police than the army. Duilintinn is protected on all sides by natural boundaries, with mountains to the north and south, an ocean to the east, and a vast, dangerous forest to the west. Once the kingdom was established, there was no need for a standing army capable of fighting the army of another land; only people willing and able to prevent internal violence within the kingdom and the occasional wild animal attack. When The Enemy became a threat, there was an attempt to adapt the guard system into an army, but it became clear very quickly that this wasn’t gonna work. The guard system was simply too spread out. Being based in House Jackie at the center of the kingdom is great when you need to be accessible everywhere at once, but really really bad if you want to defend your borders from an outside threat. When the king was attacked a second time, it became clear that another solution needed to be found, and thus, The Watch was born. Despite its intense internal hierarchy, The Guard has very little accountability to anyone but themselves. In order to be a certified guard, you have to attend a few years of boot camp within House Jackie and then return at some point every summer for one week to get re-certified. Certified guards are then given their assignments for the new year (as mentioned here) based on annual reports from each house telling House Jackie how many guards they require and where to send them. After giving them any new equipment they might need (see the post linked above) and patting them on the back, House Jackie sends the guards off to do their thing and gets ready to re-certify the group coming in next week. As for the guards… well, that’s it. They get sent to their spot, they stand there, and they guard. When they aren’t guarding… well, that’s their free time. Many guards get posts near their homes, if they ask for them, but there are many guards who would rather spend the evening in a tavern and… yeah. Good times. While these guards have very little management over them for most of the year, there are consequences for poor behavior. If a guard deserts his post, he will be put on immediate probation and not be allowed to re-certify as a guard for another year. Rowdiness and abuse of one’s post will put you on five year probation. Repeat offenses double the amount of time on probation. Of course, that’s assuming that they get caught and reported… Abusing the status of guard is considered worse than abandoning one’s post because the former is the exact opposite of a guard’s job, while the latter is simply an omission of it. Guards are meant to keep the peace, but if you cause a bar fight, you are disturbing the peace instead. On the contrary, if a guard leaves his post, he’s not necessarily guaranteeing that anything violent will happen. After a year (assuming no probation), a guard will return to House Jackie for a week, get re-certified, and do it all over again! Recertification Training Groups of guards are called in at specific intervals to ensure that nowhere is left completely unguarded during the summer months. To ensure that everyone gets properly recertified, there is a record of every guard that has ever completed the first multi-year round of training and where they have been stationed since then. If you do not arrive during your assigned time without sending ahead a message explaining why you were delayed or otherwise occupied, you get a warning. Do it again and you get put on probation. The guard takes pride in ensuring that everyone at their post has been properly certified each year, and they won’t let anyone slip under the radar. They even send horse-drawn carts to the further-flung regions of the kingdom to ensure that everyone gets to training on time with as few hiccups as possible. Compared to The Watch, which is mostly full of individuals doing their best with only a little bit of organization where it really counts and absolutely no hierarchy to speak of… well, let’s just say it’s another reason why the two groups don’t always see eye-to-eye. Magic The Guard Coalition views magic as another form of a weapon, and don’t forbid its use during assignments among journeymen mages as long as they have a focus that lets them control their powers. However, the Guard is not there to teach you how to use magic, nor should you be reliant on it during training. In order to be certified each year, you must prove that you can rely on yourself and your own strength without magic if necessary. In addition, you're expected to be able to wield a physical weapon, because while your magic might change over time into something less combat-oriented later in life, a weapon is forever. Ranks The guard absolutely has a very strict internal rank. It's one of the things that distinguishes it from The Watch. In general, the guard is supposed to sorta represent the stereotypical sort of medieval military outfit, highlighting the ways The Watch is so different from that, so yes, I'd say the rankings would be very similar, if not identical, to a knight/squire system. It's also giving me ideas about ins and outs of the training, like there's the military discipline you see these days, with drills and ranks and stuff, but maybe like a buddy system later on, a Knight gets paired with a Squire until they graduate. And traditionally a Knight would have to be, well, knighted. Which, when there's who knows how many graduating at a time, makes it a bit inconvenient. So graduation could just be a mass knighting. General wide sweep of a sword You're all Knights now piss off! Hahahahaha the "mass knighting" is definitely something that the guard coalition training would handle. I think there's a post that briefly covers how training works somewhere... long story short, you have the long multi year training at first (and you'd be a squire then) and then you graduate and you're officially a knight when you only have to come back and be recertified once a year. Which probably explains why so many bad apples are in the guard... it's not merit based, just making it through the program Higher rankings would be like getting a master's degree or something; you would keep training or return to training, probably in a tiny group of 3 to 5 under a single high-ranking instructor. Higher ranks mean you get to actually help run stuff in the coalition, from training newbies to handling complaints, punishments, and probations. Assignments Here's the thing: Hiring guards is kinda like a subscription service. People who want guards posted at their place will pay the guild x amount of money to send them x number of knights every summer after recertification. From that point on, for the whole year, those knights have two bosses: the coalition, and the person/organization who they were assigned to. They have to follow the orders they are given by the latter UNLESS it directly contradicts an order from the guard coalition. There are lines the knights of the guard are NOT supposed to cross... but. Knights don't have any oversight from the coalition hierarchy itself during the year. It's just not possible. Too many knights all spread out and not enough coalition leaders. The oversight comes from their assigned bosses, who write up reports on them and send them to the guild. These reports can be contested; one of the honor codes of the guard is that you never lie and will step up if your fellow knight was falsely accused of something. However, if the entire group of guards on an assignment is in cahoots and all lies together, they can get away with a LOT. So if they want to follow orders from an assignment that they SHOULD NOT FOLLOW then there is a decent chance they'll get away with it. Sometimes, knights are coerced into following bad orders if their boss has the other knights on his side already, since the lone knight will have no one to back him up if the lord fabricates a bad report. For this reason, the knights on an assignment are always a mixture of friends and not-friends. That way, you have someone to back you up if the rest of the group starts threatening to throw you under the bus, but can't all decide to lie together. It doesn't always work, especially for smaller assignments where only one to three guards are requested in the first place, but it's the best solution they've got If there aren't enough year long jobs for the number of knights in the guild, the remainder will be hired out for temporary jobs (guard this man for a week on his trip, deliver this valuable thing, fight these spiders in a cave, etc.). Basically your standard rpg side quest stuff. You can indicate after recertification whether you would prefer a year long job or to be on call for temporary ones. Temps allow you to travel, you get more time off to train or be with family, and you don't have to risk being stuck with a bad boss or crappy guardmates for a year. But the pay will be less consistent (though the coalition will do it's best to fill in the gaps if necessary) and the jobs are often a bit more dangerous than standing around looking intimidating to scare off pickpockets and thieves Oh also knights who are training to be higher ranks are also on call for temp jobs at the same time so bear that in mind. (And you bet your butt that favoritism plays a role in getting good armor when they're handed out each year. Its like a teacher handing out textbooks in high school where half of them are decade old and half of them are new and it always seems like you get the ones with the covers falling off, only this time there's active favoritism at fault) Its kinda like an exclusive club or something. A big clique of feeling powerful and savior-y. The ones with good intentions have a philistine-level legalist streak that refuses to break guard tradition or question their authorities, and the ones that abuse their power are often completely overlooked if they play their cards right. And because guard tradition hasn't changed in decades.... well, they are very, very good at playing their cards right. The genuinely good eggs who try to better the system or break that mold are often bullied out If you keep your head down and turn a blind eye to the guard's faults, a person of good character (if poor backbone or observation skills) could get through, but if you try to challenge their traditions, heh. Not taken well. Armor/Uniform All of the guards in the kingdom are trained and sent to their respective posts by House Jackie. Even guards who are not a member of House Jackie are still required to train there for a few months during the summer in order to get a job as a guard for the following year. It’s kinda like a certification process. Then there’s an application process where you indicate where you would like to be posted for the next year. Almost everyone who wants to be posted in the house where they reside will be able to, but if you want to travel elsewhere in the kingdom, you’re not guaranteed to be sent to your first choice. All that to say, while each house has its own guards, they are all trained together within House Jackie. However, your assumption is correct! Each house will provide the guards sent to them with equipment with their insignia. Some postings are more lax than others about using personal equipment, depending on location. If you’re keeping the peace in a local tavern, no one cares what armor you’ve got, but if you’re guarding a government building, you better have the house insignia on your chest. Now, specifics time. I imagine that everyone will have the same basic equipment, regardless of house. You don’t want to train with one type of armor thinking you’ll be assigned to House Marvin, only to be assigned to House Jameson with armor you aren’t used to. So the basic armor, shield, and standard-issue version of your weapon(s) of choice will all be the same across the board. However, these items will look very different depending on the house. The colors and animal of the house are featured all over the armor and weapons of their guards. So long as it doesn’t upset the balance, weight, usage, or maneuverability of the item, the houses are allowed to customize the aesthetic of their standard issue weapons and armor in almost any way they wish. Every few years, when the previous batch of weapons and armor start wearing out, a lucky blacksmith or artisan is tasked by the house to create new designs for the house guard. In addition, guards get to keep one item of their armor or weaponry after their time working for the house. This entire situation has become an unspoken competition between the houses to attract the best guards by providing the best weapons. They are given one nice uniform for special occasions. It wouldn't be a uniform though the way we think of modern day dress uniforms. It'd be basically the same livery that'd go over their armor, but over a plain colored tunic or something Like er, I don't know the words but tabards (?) or something with house colours The drapey bits The things that look like curtains that they cut a hole in and stuck over their armor. Armor is standardized by house. One of the last steps of the yearly summer training thing is to pick up your new armor for that year, giving you a tiny bit of time to get it tweaked to better fit before being sent out. You'd actually know based on that what house you'll be sent to before you get your official assignment, which will tell you specific stuff like where and who and for how long and yadda yadda. Guards with temp jobs get whatever armor is leftover lol. Usually you'll get one that matches your own house, but sometimes you get unlucky and have to go random. You'd get both your armor and tunic for official occasions at this time.' ' Knighting Outside of Guard Being knighted doesn't mean you get to just jump into the guild. To the guard coalition, people knighted for merit are considered just "honorary" knights and is kinda seen as a sub par form of knighthood. Kinda like how people know the queen is a figurehead and the parliment is the actual ruling body of the uk. Being queen is a BIG DEAL and so is being knighted for merit or something, but everyone kinda knows what lines they should and shouldnt cross as this sort of knight. If they try to waltz into the coalition like they own the place they are gonna get their butt kicked straight out the door. However, if one of these honorary knights joins the guild and humbly asks to do the process properly as well, they often get fast-tracked thru the program and are generally highly respected once they get guild certification. And finally, if someone who was already in the guild program was knighted in this way, the guild would respect it and treat it as if that knight had gotten certified in the normal way. However, they still have to do the yearly training thing for recertification like everyone else Relationship with The Watch The watch and the guard at the best have a healthy respect for each other even if they disagree about how to address the issue at hand. At worst, they can get caught up in the idea of us-versus-them and team pride and all that that they think anyone in the guard is an insult to the watch or vice versa. And then you may get a fight. The Watch and the Guard are run very differently, so disagreements come up often. In most guilds, being a watcher is considered a potential way of applying the skills of your guild, like a normal job, but even better bc you're responding to one of the most significant crises to Duilintinn's people and culture that we've yet seen. Most guilds see it as a point of pride to have members in The Watch, kinda like how schools brag about the stuff their students do beyond simple academics. The exception to this is, of course, The Guard Coalition, which is both a guild AND a job. By contrast, the Mercenary Syndicate is a guild that helps you to get a job in a world full of knights, so if that job is The Watch, yay for you! The Guard is an outlier from all other guilds in this way Leaving the Coalition Based on both thematic reasons and actual canon lore, I think The Watch would be okay with people leaving. I’ll first go over the thematic explanation, and then the (much simpler) lore reasoning. Thematically, I’ve been developing the Guard Coalition and The Watch as direct foils for each other. Each organization has the same goal- defending the kingdom- but their methods, organization, legacy, ideals, and just about everything else are completely different. I don’t know if I’ve ever mentioned this in canon, but the Guard Coalition looks down on people who leave to pursue other careers. Retirement and temporary leave from assignments is fine, but you’re still considered one of their own. To forsake your duty to the guard permanently is seen as a direct insult to every knight in the coalition. On the other hand, The Watch won’t pressure anyone to stay within the organization. In part, this is purely another thematic contrast between The Watch and the Guard Coalition, but there’s also a lore reason why this is true. If you remember, The Watch was formed after Duilintinn’s founding, while the Guard predates the kingdom by centuries. Therefore, The Watch abides by Duilintinn’s cultural emphasis on finding ones place in the world, while the traditions of the Guard Coalition predate this shift in cultural values. Category:Guilds